


Divine Adaptations

by Like_a_Hurricane



Series: Catch and Release, and related Keepsakes [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Breathplay, Frostiron Month, Jotunnheim world-building strikes again, M/M, Sort of PWP, prompt: special dress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-13
Updated: 2014-07-13
Packaged: 2018-02-08 14:51:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1945269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Like_a_Hurricane/pseuds/Like_a_Hurricane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony was bored while Loki was dealing with some particularly tedious politics. When Kaata finds him observing Jotunn body-art at a nearby festival, he finds himself going along with the Voice of Jotunnheim’s slightly-mischievous suggestions because, well, they’re all far from boring. So perhaps he undergoes a bit of a wardrobe change as a result, among other things.</p><p>How exactly that turned into his giving Jotunns tango lessons is a bit more complicated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Divine Adaptations

Tony Stark knew the value of a fine suit well, be it one of armor, or Armani.

Being well-dressed was something he took quiet pride in, whether the clothes he wore happened to be a tuxedo, or jeans and a tank top. He knew when he looked good, and was vain enough to maintain the confident belief that he almost always looked damn fine, even when covered in sweat and blood after a battle.

With the exception of some key insecurities regarding his Jotunn form and color-scheme early in their relationship, Loki was otherwise similarly self-aware and self-confident. He had long ago come to terms with not being as muscular and physically imposing as Thor, but he knew himself to be more than a pretty face, and wore clothes and armor which very much emphasized all about him which qualified as tall, dark and handsome. He took to wearing Midgardian fashions with the same ease he had taken to the local fashions of Vanaheim, Alfheim, and even Dvergarheim in his many travels during his youth, pursuing scholarly knowledge throughout every realm he could reach, including some which he was never supposed to visit.

Thor had privately admitted to Tony that he had always been somewhat envious of his brother’s ability to blend in, on other worlds, and to settle into their cultural expectations, learn the nuances of the local populace’s character and social mores, and seem to be accepted with relative ease, where Thor himself felt more as though he stood out like a big sore Aesir thumb.

Tony knew that most of it was illusion. Loki was a chameleon in dress and behavior as much as he was in deception-style. He could appear accepted and seamlessly a part of the Avengers in photo-shoots for the press, or even in battle at times, or around their table, for periods of time, but looking closer there was still frequently a sense of faint distance and unease between the god and most of the other Avengers, save for Tony and Natasha who had come to regard him a bit fondly (thought Nat might not admit as much aloud within Clint’s hearing range), and T’Challa whose whole society had been isolationist enough during the invasion of New York to only have a vague awareness of Loki’s part in it, and less of a personal grudge; although it was the ripple-effects of both that invasion, and incidents with Hydra after their near-successful full S.H.I.E.L.D. takeover, which brought Wakanda back onto the world stage in the first place...

Tony also knew that Loki still wore Aesir clothing when he visited Jotunnheim, even after thawing that world of all ice, and making himself an instrument for their people to rely upon, for the healing of their planet as ancient survivors long-preserved under all that ice began to rebuild cultures and cities that had been lost to the nine realms for millennia. It struck the mad inventor as something significantly anomalous, for Loki, who had also shown him Alfheim and dressed them both in clothing suitable for not too-far standing-out amongst the locals there, including a wardrobe change when they went from the cooler northern coastal region, to a hotter southern continent and a major trade city on the edge of a vast desert.

Jotunn fashion was, Tony knew, a bit chaotic in the wake of some of the post-thaw culture shock, between the populace that had been living on top of the ice, and those long preserved below it. At first, the icier Jotunns had worn very minimal clothing period, leaving the powerful weapon of their own bare skin easily accessible; also it had always been only practical, for a world with relatively scant resources aside from ice, to not drape themselves in excess leathers or fabrics when so little was available, but that had begun to change.

The most common article of clothing worn among warriors icy and otherwise consisted of knee-length trousers of sturdy material, usually leather, but the style varied: some buttoned up the sides, others buttoned at the front, but had laces at the lower-back and down the outside of both legs to improve the fit of the garment. They were seemingly unisex, as were the mid- to almost-floor-length skirts sometimes worn over them for the sake of fashion by those higher in rank. Some of those without ice in their nature preferred longer trousers, and often wore heavy cloaks in colder regions or just where the climate was still less stable.

In addition to that, many biologically female Jotunns, whether icy by nature or otherwise, wore simple bandeaux-like wraps more out of practicality than modesty; those with smaller breasts tended to be more sensitive and the covering helped them feel secure, while those with larger breasts that simply got in the way of certain intensive physical labor or other activities, wore slightly tighter wraps just for the sake of not having to worry about them. Some males wore similar wraps just for decorative purposes, particularly mages, who often incorporated bits of casual spell-work into the fabric of such garments. Higher-ranking Jotunns or those who didn’t participate in as much manual labor, such as artisans and mages, sometimes wore such wraps covering them from chest to hips, showing off colorful patterned fabrics just because they could.

The older Jotunns from below the ice, Tony couldn’t help but notice, loved being draped in fine fabrics and other decorations, especially those of higher rank. Those without ice in their nature tended to wear sleeveless tunics, with sashes about their waists, often in complicatedly knotted or folded wrapping styles. Some wore long strips of cloth bandolier-like, over one shoulder and then tied either at the opposite hip or, more complicatedly, at their lower backs so that the fabric’s tails fanned out behind them; often either way, the same sashes usually worn about the waist of tunics often held those bandoliers in place too. Even in warmer climes, shawls and large scarves worn in various styles were also popular.

Only some of the oldest mages from under the ice seemed to wear long coats or indeed anything with long sleeves; although Tony still wasn’t entirely sure why that was. Everyone else susceptible to cold just wore a long, cape-like cloak wrapped around themselves, but when they reached out for something, their bare arms didn’t even seem very prone to goose-bumps. Tony supposed even those without ice in their veins must be more cold-resistant than some other races in the nine realms.

Where Tony got it into his head to visit an open-air market while waiting on Loki to finish up some diplomatic discussions with the king and some tribal leaders from the south, the inventor wasn’t actually sure. He usually kept up with his lover’s diplomatic actions, but that particular meeting was nothing but inevitable conclusions he knew the trickster was more than capable of making all other parties reach, in the end, despite their stubbornness, and so it would’ve been fairly dull to observe, for Tony that day.

So he instead hit the market stalls just down the street, where there was some form of festival atmosphere: apparently it was celebration of an ancient holiday the inventor couldn’t even pretend he wanted to attempt to pronounce, but he let himself get caught up in the occasion itself regardless.

He was eventually found by the Voice of Jotunnheim, at a stall where people were being painted with intricate designs that reminded him vaguely of Henna, but not quite. Instead of a paste left to sit on the skin for a time, the stain was painted on directly, with a few small brushes allowing for different levels of fine detail. The designs themselves were somehow both swirling, and oddly geometric, and not quite like celtic knots. All of designs seemed to be made up of single lines crossing one another or wrapping around one another without touching, with new swirls branching off here and there, amidst otherwise angular and zig-zagging straighter lines, and gentler curves.

“They look a little bit like the marks Hel has,” Tony observed.

“You should wear them,” Kaata said. “They last for only a few days.”

“I don’t even know what they’re for.”

“They are just traditional patterns, decoration designed to play with shadows,” hänen said, sounding amused. “These are not magic, of any kind. There are different painters all throughout this fairground who use entirely different styles. We wear paint like this upon our bodies to celebrate beauty, and become art, for a while, while we dance around fires and celebrate amongst our community and those we love.” The tall, fey-looking Jotunn grinned at him. “You should let this artist paint you; her design is indeed inspired somewhat by more natural markings Jotunns and others we respect such as Queen Hel do wear. If you let her paint you, I will supply you clothes better than the ones you currently wear, in order to show them off properly.”

Suddenly catching on, Tony began to grin himself. “Yeah... Yeah okay.”

So he wound up stripped to his boxers being painted by a Jotunn woman four feet taller than Loki, and her two apprentices who were closer to almost-human height. Each apprentice began with his wrists and moved down his arms, but the senior artist, called Heidi, began with the inventor’s chest, after admiring the tattoo there for a few long moments, smiling at little when she met his gaze.

“You are already wearing very fine art, here,” she said. “I shall do my best to draw  eyes to it.” Lowered a very long paintbrush with a very small and precise tip, and began to paint dye onto his skin.

And she did, leaving just over an inch of skin untouched between the circular tattoo and her own designs, highlighting it, and letting multiple thorn-like little protrusions break the uniformity of that barrier just a little, their sharp corners always pointing right at the center of Tony’s tattoo. She worked from his collarbone down his chest to his stomach before her apprentices finished their initial work on his arms and the inventor was asked to stand up.

Both apprentices finished the parts of his arms previously out of their reach, then worked over his shoulders, up the back and sides of his neck to the backs of his ears and his hairline, to the edges of his face, only letting occasional spikes and whorls decorate the corner of his jaw and frame the outermost edges of his cheekbones. His throat was left bare, even as they tied in their designs with the master artisan’s at the outer ends of his collarbones, and then began to paint down his back.

Below the waist, it got a little weird. The fronts of his legs were fine, but Tony had been a little dubious about being asked to strip off his boxers and lay face-down for the rest afterward.

Having his ass painted was a novel sensation, and a bit awkward, but when they left him to inspect their work, once it was all dried and the designs finished, Tony had to admit they did fine work. The color of stain chosen had clung to his skin looking like water-color paint, never quite truly black, the lightest areas from each brush-stroke never truly bare, but stained blackish-grey, to greyish-red in the lightest places, as though the dark stain were rusting on particularly long sections. It had sunk into his skin and left color behind, but no residue to scratch or smear off.

The longer straight or more gently-curved lines within the design all followed the paths of different muscles, and the spiraling whorls and thorns here and there fit like puzzle-pieces between those more sweeping lines, and the results were frankly gorgeous. Even the remaining unpainted regions––his throat, his face, hands, the soles of his feet, his upper inner thighs, the entire groin region from below his hipbones to the tops of his thighs––didn’t look oddly naked by contrast, but like the eye was meant to be drawn there.

Kaata returned half an hour after he was finished, to find him sitting around in just his jeans, happy to sit around drinking something hot, steaming and slightly spicy where bypassers could admire the still-drying darker shading one of the apprentices had done on his back while he’d waited.

“You are satisfied with the artist’s work?”

“Hell yes. You have presents?”

Hän did.

By the time the Voice had finished showing off the fabrics of the tailored garments, both of them were grinning evilly with fully shared understanding.

 

~~

 

Tony was reminded of the key differences between theory and practice, once he was actually wearing Jotunn clothing, of course. In theory, he knew he looked hot in anything. In practice, new styles of clothing felt weird at first, always.

The lack of shoes? Fine. He’d even come to appreciate the fact he was allowed to walk through the royal palace around here without shoes for days at a time and no one would even bat an eye.

The black knee-length leather trousers felt a bit like capri pants, or like they belonged to a time period sometime before the 1800s on earth. Except. Well. Leather.

And with lacing up the sides and at lower back that made them unnecessarily complicated, but when he’d muttered complaints about that to Kaata, hän had only grinned at him lasciviously and said, “Trust me, Anthony.”

One day, Tony vowed, not for the first time, he’d get people on this planet to understand it was not at all uncouth to call him by less than his full first name; pet-names seemed to be very much a matter of personal closeness, amongst Jotunns, and the idea that Tony preferred a shortened version of his own name to be used by everyone didn’t seem to sit well with most of them. He planned to wear them down. It wasn’t like he didn’t have time.

Also: the laces, once laced, did indeed look pretty sexy.

Next was the bandolier-like bit. This one was in a dark wine red fabric, heavy and smooth, embroidered with dark but still almost-metallic gold thread in a complex pattern of interwoven triangles, which Kaata handled expertly, draping it from his shoulder to his hip, pulling it around to his lower back and pinning it to lie flat there while hän arranged the next part to lie properly along his back. Where the two pieces met, at different angles, they were held in place by small metal loops that reminded Tony of safety-pins. Once the fabric tails were settled in a particular way, Kaata began wrapping a thinner sash just above his natural waist, made of shiny silk the color of sun-baked rust, making the draped fabric taper attractively, but it still felt to Tony like all he was wearing consisted of a series of oversized cloth belts. He was also certain that magic was the only possible explanation for how Kaata managed, with those first anchoring wraps of the fabric, to somehow achieve the effect most Jotunns seemed to strive for, which was for the ends of the drape over their shoulder to trail behind them like the tails of a Midgardian tailcoat. Larger metal loops, these ones shiny and brassy in color, with very small clips to lock them shut, anchored the initial wrap. Then Kaata took both ends of the sash, wrapping each side between and around the other, to form a geometric pattern the inventor was a bit impressed by the complexity of. Then both ends of it were braided around a leather belt, which secured the whole thing tightly––but not at all uncomfortably so, somehow––about Tony’s waist.

Kaata then stepped back to admire hänen work. “You look more Jotunn than human now, almost.” Walking around him, a smug grin tugged at the curve of hänen lips. “I’m looking forward to seeing your lover’s reaction.”

Tony turned to look at himself in the nearest full-length mirror, and blinked a bit at the novel sensation of an unfamiliar combination of areas where his skin felt exposed, versus covered, as cool air stirred around him. It felt weird, but not actually off-putting. He could adjust. Seeing himself in the mirror, though, his jaw might have dropped.

“See?” the Voice teased.

“You weren’t kidding. Wow. Just...” He turned a bit one way, then the other, to look at the back of his ensemble. The markings down his back, and the fabrics draped alongside them looked gorgeous, he couldn’t even begin to deny. “Thank you, Kaata. This is... wow, this is stunning.”

Smiling at him warmly, hän rested a hand on his shoulder. “Come. Loki knows, by now, that we are here, though he will certainly not expect to see you like this. Let us find dancing, and await him.”

“Dancing...”

“You cannot tell me a man such as you is wary of being seen dancing?”

“I’m not sure how much Midgardian styles of dance might seem hilarious to a lot of people from a different planet,” Tony responded. “They look pretty ridiculous just amongst ourselves, over time, with the exception of some more timeless forms we’ve come up with so far, that haven’t yet lost their appeal.”

“Teach me some of them, then,” Kaata challenged, confident and proud, with a gleefully fierce smirk. “I and my cousins. We can start a new Jotunn fashion of it, before the day is up.”

Tony was reminded quite why he so liked coming to Jotunnheim.

“Yeah. That sounds like a blast, actually.”

 

~~

 

Which was how Loki found his lover and Kaata both giving an impromptu tango class to, by that time, over a dozen pairs of Jotunns, all surrounded by a crowd of interested onlookers, in the middle of the fairgrounds where the music was in full swing. The Voice and hän kin were very quick learners, with natural grace, and able to fix their awareness enough upon Tony that the inventor could demonstrate both leading and following steps on his own at the front of the group, and his best pupils would move in time with him, and demonstrate amongst the crowd for those not close enough to the front to properly see the form.

Loki didn’t actually spot Tony right away, though he could hear his lover’s voice, and followed it slowly through the crowd, who easily parted for him with respectful gestures of silent welcome. Passing one of Kaata’s cousins, he began to get an inkling of quite how this class had spontaneously occurred, knowing both the Voice and Tony well enough, along with their respective mischievous and easily-bored tendencies.

Then, once he stepped to the front of the crowd and laid eyes on Tony that he lost the ability to think clearly altogether, struck as he was with shock and awe as he stared, and stared, while the human genius kept talking, and gesturing...

Then Loki fully recognized it as tango and was hit with sense-memories from a few private lessons they’d shared, in preparation for some recent public appearances: closeness and the feel of Tony moving with him, against him, and just _moving him_ , heart and soul, with heated looks and the tension the dance had built between them. When the inventor’s eyes caught on him, and met his own, Loki could feel his breath catch, and couldn’t find within him sufficient willpower to hide any of the naked admiration he was sure could be seen clearly on his face.

Tony smiled in return, pausing mid-sentence. Then he looked back out at the rest of his audience with a provocative smile, and declared, “I’m going to give you all a choice, now, between finishing this lesson, and seeing a full demonstration.” He aimed a come-hither hand gesture Loki’s way as he said it.

As awareness of the trickster’s presence made it’s way through the rest of the crowd, the answer became steadily more unanimous. They wanted to see the full demonstration, even if it meant ending their previous lesson early.

Helplessly, the god found himself drawn forward and onto the slightly raised bit of ground Tony stood upon: a natural stage, at the edge of the fair ground. When the inventor reached for him, Loki moved into the touch of those familiar hands with the same inexorability as the flight of a moth in the direction of a flame. He let Tony capture one of his hands, but the other slipped free and caressed the side of Tony’s face in a way that dragged the dear human’s entire body closer to him.

Per Tony’s request, Kaata might have been holding up the inventor’s phone while it recorded video of the whole thing. Hän might have also chosen that moment to very quietly move a bit closer, as unobtrusively as possible.

There was murmuring throughout the crowd about the contrast between them: Tony dressed as he was, and Loki in very simple, but clearly Aesir-styled, green and black travel cloak and leathers. Then the inventor tugged at Loki’s cloak and proceeded to vanish it. He did the same with the bandolier and long coat beneath it. The god was clearly paying absolutely zero attention to their audience, by this point, having entirely forgotten their existence as Tony’s hands ran down over both of the trickster’s arms, and then waited, eyebrows raising. _Your turn._

Loki considered, looking his lover up and down slowly with that same awestruck expression from earlier, until the wicked curve of his smile at last brought more playfulness back into it. A gesture and a whirl of magic and Loki stood before him in tight, only slightly faded black jeans, stylish black boots, and one of Tony’s own black tank-tops, which seemed to be a bit short for the god himself, just barely reaching his navel. The tattoo on his hipbone was highly visible. There was some amusement from the crowd, though only Loki was close enough to see how just deeply Tony blushed.

“Another time, definitely,” the inventor managed, “But not tonight.”

“I had hoped so, but did want to reward you as well,” Loki responded, and gestured again. This time his ensemble was replaced by a simple dark green tunic with a high collar but no sleeves (almost but not quite like it might be from Alfheim, but it was too long, and the trailing ends clearly fashioned to look like the popular “tail” usually formed by Jotunn-style garments, the illusion aided by how the tunic was cinched back by the black cloth wrapped about Loki’s waist in a layered design that resembled his battle-leathers only a little, though the metal accents much more obviously hearkened back to them, much like the wolfish design themes sculpted into the large gold beads along the  thick-cord belt which secured and anchored the black fabric about his waist, and braided with the ends of the thinner gold-embroidered black draping tight––tighter than was the common style––across Loki’s chest. The same metal accents ran down the outer sides of his black leather knee-length trousers, right up until they buttoned shut just below the tops of a pair of very tall black boots close to his own usual style, but a little more formal, and apparently thigh-high under those pants going by the visible lines under the leather, which alone almost threatened to melt Tony’s brain.

It was not the current Jotunn style, quite, but it was very much Loki’s own and his lover couldn’t help but grin brightly. “Wow.”

“I could say the same,” Loki murmured, kissing his lips briefly and lingering close, speaking just low enough for the inventor to catch the words as he added, “You look beautiful.”

Tony might have flushed still more deeply, because he’d been called a lot of flattering things by a lot of people, but he knew how selective Loki tended to be with words that meant a great deal to him, and that ‘beautiful’ in reference to a person, meant to him being struck by the beauty of something emotionally and physically both, such that he felt a level of heart-aching wonder.

He knew this because Loki had told it to him, once, after a nasty battle with a particularly devoted Hydra cell doing their level best to take down key members of the Avengers once and for all. He had scratched the word into Tony’s skin, over and over again, until the inventor realized it wasn’t about his skin at all, but getting under it. Loki loved everything under his skin, and thought it was beautiful, and he would keep trying to show Tony that beauty until the inventor could love it too.

 _When I say you are beautiful, Tony, I mean that you embody all that is beautiful to me, whenever you are on my mind, and you are_ perpetually _in my thoughts, always._

“Looks good on you, too,” Tony said, his voice wavering only a little as he felt Loki push down the cloth on his chest just a little, fingertip tracing the unmarked skin haloing the inventor’s tattoo.

“We’ll require an actual tango,” Loki said flatly. His eyes were full of heat and promise as he let the fabric go with apparent reluctance

The inventor cleared his throat. “Right. Tango. There’s a crowd here.”

“There is indeed, and they’re all yours,” the god assured him, tugging at his lover’s hands, pulling himself in position to––follow.

Tony stared up at him just a little wide-eyed.

Loki blushed this time, just slightly, but didn’t elaborate. He hadn’t actually done anything but lead, so far, in public, save for on one or two occasions just during practice, out of some idle curiosity. Both occasions had led to other things, but then, that happened every time they attempted tango privately.

Kaata seemed to realize they were both too distracted and signaled the nearest musicians, who had joined them as soon as they had heard Tony a couple of hours before trying to keep his class in tempo. They had since learned, by ear, a couple of pieces from Tony’s phone. They began to play the second one.

Leading Loki in a dance, Tony had found, was a singular sort of experience. When the trickster led, he tended to be gracious and smooth, but also generous, and usually only outright wicked once flirtatiously provoked at least twice, and once so provoked he would proceed to lead very differently indeed; and yet, being led, Loki felt light as air, so in tune with his partner that they hardly seemed to touch, except for _oh where they touched_ very closely indeed, especially when it came to Argentine tango.

As they settled into their first few turns, it slowly occurred to Tony how they both looked: the Jotunn mage tall and pale dressed all in dark color, and the flame-like human, smaller but painted with the illusions of shadow and fire, and draped in similar colors and patterns. Loki had wanted him to lead. Loki had seen him dressed in Jotunn garb before donning it himself, and was letting his human lover lead him, in teaching tango to the locals, and putting on this show for the crowd beyond them. Loki had also called him beautiful, like it cracked something in him to say it.

The next few embellishments of footwork Loki used to make them turn sharply, unexpectedly, Tony jerked him a little too close with a sudden squeeze and held his gaze. “Why wait ‘til now?” he asked, barely loud enough to be heard.

Loki dropped his gaze suddenly, clearly chagrinned, but his movements didn’t waver or hesitate; he kept pace.

“Not appealing?”

“Not... altogether comfortable-looking?” the trickster tried.

He spun Loki out from him, but only briefly, and they seemed to sway together as they spun with the god’s return to him, and back apart just a little once they slowed, stopped just briefly, and changed direction.

“It’s a bit weird, yeah. I still feel a little bit unusually naked and yet still formal at the same time in ways that make me understand something Pepper tried to explain to me about backless dresses,” Tony murmured. Then he saw Loki’s blush darken. “You think it looks _feminine_ don’t you?”

The god cringed, looking acutely embarrassed, just for a moment. “I... _was_ raised in _Asgard_ , and few though they have always ever been, it’s widely known that there are––certain unsavory places where people dress... slightly more like this.” He cleared his throat. “In retrospect, that probably developed after the war ended, and I’d rather not dwell upon all of the connotations, there, considering all who are... employed in such places are actually Aesir. I’ve been trying to come to terms with it, but remained slightly embarrassed despite myself.” He cleared his throat. “Seeing you like this, I could see nothing about you to be embarrassed by, to say the very least. You look...” He trailed off helplessly, and seemed to subconsciously move himself through the footwork leading up to being spun out again.

Reeling him back in, Tony smiled up at him warmly. “You still made it your own, though, I see.”

Loki nodded, only a little hesitantly.

“You’ve tried these on before.”

“I did not wish to remain so...” He looked down helplessly. “I am aware of too many connotations that can be read into my continued preferences to Aesir garb that simply are not applicable, but I see them in the eyes of others regardless. Some here remember Aesir better than others, and their understanding makes it worse.”

Feeling the god’s fingers trailing up and down his back as they swayed, Tony nodded, mulling it over. “The dancing was Kaata’s idea. I didn’t want to look ridiculously Midgardian, though, and I told hän that most of our dancing tends to be pretty ridiculous, except for a few styles.” He glanced around Loki’s shoulder just briefly for confirmation and––yes, his and Kaata’s students, as well as Kaata, were also dancing with the music now, for the eyes of the crowd, most of them improvising a little, to fill in where they hadn’t managed to complete the lesson or polish their forms, but they moved together with enough familiarity with one another and dancing both, to somehow make it all work. “Hän said I should teach, then, and that hän and hänen cousins would have ‘a new Jotunn fashion of it, before the day is up’ and I think they’ve succeeded.” At the end of the next turn he held them stopped and gestured with his chin.

Loki turned to look out at the other dancers and began to smile with a pure, helpless sort of joy that looked almost like it wasn’t sure how it even got there. “By the nine they...”

“They’re adaptive, around here, same as you. They knew you’d come ‘round.” He grinned up at the trickster god as he suddenly he found himself no longer leading, and followed as Loki began their dance anew.

Tony kept grinning, even as the rest of the dance left him breathless, Loki guiding them even when some of his lover’s footwork embellishments, twists and pulls bordered on rebellious, but the inventor never managed to actually pull away, nor let himself even try very hard, and brushed a kiss against the line of Loki’s jaw every time he was pulled closer again. When the music and their number both reached a flourishing end, and the god dipped him, Tony’s breathless sigh was almost a joyous laugh, or might have become one if Loki hadn’t proceeded to kiss him deeply, and thoroughly, to the sounds of enthusiastic applause and whistles.

Once they slowly pulled themselves back upright, and finally broke apart for air, Tony panted, “Wow, I _love_ you,” and wrapped both arms around Loki’s neck pressing up and close. “Now let’s scram, so I can ride you into our mattress back in your nest.”

“Our nest,” Loki chided, “my dearest love.”

Tony blushed deeply when the god kissed his nose.

“But first, do we not bow?” the trickster gestured toward their audience, who had by now progressed to enthusiastically heckling them to kiss again.

“Yeah.” Tony disentangled enough to turn, with Loki, and bow low and dramatic to their audience, but as soon as they stood upright again and their eyes met, both of them vanished, hand in hand, grinning at one another like the infatuated devils they were.

 

~~

 

Ten minutes later, Tony was seriously concerned that Loki might be trying to trace every single line painted onto him with his tongue. He was also concerned that Loki might not succeed if the rest of his clothing stayed where it still, frustratingly, stayed on him. He wasn’t quite complaining about the licking thought. He might, in fact, have been melting slowly as Loki’s devoted mouth slowly made its way down his spine, starting at his mid back and just slowly–––trailing–––“Oh, yes lower.”

Loki hummed against his skin, fingers digging into his lover’s bare hips. He had managed to get the inventor’s trousers and boxers off, but had since then gotten distracted. He and his tongue particularly. “Greedy,” he chided.

“You say that,” Tony panted, then made sucked in a surprised gasp at the feel of that clever tongue licking right over his opening without warning. “Oh fuck!”

“Be patient, my love,” the trickster urged gently, his breath warm on Tony’s skin where it was dry, but cold where it touched skin still wet from his tongue. Then he trailed his fingers back up to the sash about Tony’s waist. After tracing over the contours of it once more, he chose to unweave it from the leather belt holding most of it in place with a simple spell, then sharply rip it away the rest in one sharp movement, with only a bit of magic assistance to keep both sides of the rip fairly clean. When Tony’s moan trailed off into a slight noise of protest, the trickster repaired it with magic and tossed it onto the table beside his bed, safely out of his way.

Then his mouth trailed down again.

Tony exhaled shakily as that talented tongue flicked across his hole and then pressed in, wet and slick and always surprisingly strong as well as deft. Trying his best not to squirm, the inventor panted and shivered at the sensations of that talented tongue doing things that just–– _oh! Ohhh, that shouldn’t be possible, and possibly shouldn’t be legal, so good, too good, oh fuck_.

Loki’s hands were stroking his thighs in long, smooth gestures, until suddenly gripping down hard, and pushing them further open, letting the god’s tongue slip in still further, and the noises that escaped Tony’s mouth soon after increased a little in pitch and desperation.

“L-Loki, f-fuck, how d––hnnnghhh––” His whole body jerked at the feel of Loki releasing one of his thighs and proceeding to reach around and stroke his cock, making the inventor lean his weight over the bed still more heavily, struggling to keep his balance with Loki continuing to kneel behind and do–– _Oh yes_ ** _that_**. Tony’s words cut off with a noise almost like a sob.

Only then did the trickster pull back, and let his lover have a moment to regain his senses. “What is it you need, my love?”

“F-fuck me.”

“Turn over then, for I would see you like this.”

Pushing the last fabric off of his own shoulders and the bed both, Tony obliged, and spread out on the back, facing up and watching Loki’s face as the god took him in with an expression of awe and love that took the inventor’s breath away. “Loki...” At a loss for further words, he wrapped his legs around the god and pulled him a bit closer, making Loki beam at him and kiss him again.

There was just a hint of mint to the kiss, which Tony had come to recognize from spells equivalent to brushing one’s teeth. It was moments like this he was always a bit stunned to recall he’d somehow managed to fall in love with a gentleman after all. A gentleman expert in uses of magic in the midst of hedonistic debauchery, perhaps, but truth be told, that would now always be Tony’s favorite sort of gentleman.

“You are more perfect than I would ever presume myself capable of imagining,” the god murmured, “and I love how much you love being fucked by me until you can hardly speak, or think.”

Hissing at the feel of two long fingers, slick with lubrication, press inside him, Tony let his back arch and his head fall back. Feeling Loki’s mouth trail down his bare throat, he sighed contently, and then moaned outright when the trickster’s fingers curled up within him to get the perfect angle at which to drag across his prostate as he began slowly fucking Tony open with them.

Then he felt Loki biting at his skin where he knew the stain ended and the small expanse of bare skin at and below his throat began, like framing the area with teeth-marks was equivalent to claiming sole rights to it; although at the same time, his other hand could’t seem to stop touching the rest of Tony’s painted skin with a mixture of wonder and pure worshipful adoration.

“Is this what it’s like to be worshipped by a god?” Tony joked, though his voice cracked and he was clearly approaching a point where words would leave him altogether.

“Would you like that, Tony?” Loki rumbled against his skin. “Would you hear that my loyalty and devotion to your worship will remain true, and that I your humble subject am honored to be permitted to touch you like this?” He put more force into the strokes of his fingers even as his lips trailed back up Tony’s throat light as the whisper of a feather.

“L-Loki, yes, please.”

“I would serve you as I would no other,” the trickster murmured. “I would do for you anything if you required it. Even at the price of my own freedom, which I entrust solely to you.”

Tony almost couldn’t breathe for a second. “Loki, you––oh my god, you’re––that’s true, isn’t it?”

Another kiss, pressed soft against the inventor’s lips even as he added another finger and those lips parted in a sultry moan. “I am yours, and I trust you as aI cannot myself, and you are as a god to me, Tony, my love.”

The inventor dragged him into a more heated kiss, then, demanding and hungry and needy as Loki kissed him just as hard, just as fierce.

_Even at the price of my own freedom..._

Both of them valued their freedom more than their lives, if it came down to a decision between the two. Loki’s conviction then...

_I am content to be captured and kept by you._

“I like you keeping me too,” Tony managed to pant, when the kiss finally broke. “Now fuck me, please, Loki, I need you now.”

The trickster didn’t need to be asked twice, lining himself up and hooking one of Tony’s legs over his shoulder, and then pushing in, agonizingly slowly. “How much do you need me, my god?”

The inventor almost came just at that. “So close, Loki, I’m so close, I need you so bad I might come just form needing you if you don’t g-give it to me first, _please._ ” Then he cried out sharply as the god’s hand wrapped hard around the base of his cock, holding him there, teetering close to falling over the edge and about to die from the anticipation alone. “L-loki, fuck me now,” he groaned.

“As my god wishes.”

“Fffuck, you’re right, that’s so hot,” Tony muttered.

Loki chuckled, but then abruptly pulled out and began pounding back in fast and deep, over and over, each drag of his cock across the inventor’s prostate earning him another cry of praise, or desperation, or both.

“Good, yes, ahhh let me come, make me come, Loki, I need you to...” All of his breath left him at once when the god nipped sharply at his let nipple and squeezed the head of his cock with his other hand, at the same time. “Fuck! AHhh yes more, please.”

“Do you want more, or do you want to come, deity mine?”

“Isss it too much to ask fffor both?” Tony moaned, struggling as the pleasure became too much, became painful, with how badly he needed to come. Then he heard a whispered spell and felt a length of fabric from the floor slither up onto the bed and around his neck, tightening slowly.

Tony was a raw nerve, alight with stimuli, alight with pain and endorphins and bliss, and the rhythm of Loki fucking into him and the burn at his throat and in his lungs just for a few brief moments, as his ears filled with the sound of his own heartbeat.

Then the pressure dropped away from his throat and Loki shuddered against him, his thrusts less controlled, rougher. “You’re so beautifully tight, so close and without breath, Tony.”

“Again,” the inventor rasped. “F-fuck, please do that ahg-”

He struggled a bit, but Loki only held him in place and pounded still harder into him, deep and overwhelming. Then the pressure dropped again, this time from both his throat and around the base of his cock, just as he heard Loki make a familiar sound against him, barely holding himself together, pounding hard as he could to take his lover with him. Then he moaned, brokenly, as he started to come and Tony gave a choked-off scream as his own climax ripped through him, making him writhe and nearly sob with it as Loki rode them both through it until they both felt almost too raw to move further; although after a few minutes to catch their breaths, they managed to collapse and wrap around on another comfortably, with only a few hisses from lingering sensitivity.

“So... you like the body art.”

“I like your body decorated. It suits you, to be valued as highly as a work of art, at the very least, even by those who do not know who you are, and everything else about you worth cherishing.”

“Did you blow something up? You’re being almost too sweet.”

“I would never set off actual explosions without you, if I could help it, darling.”

“Could you?”

“Hm?”

“Help it?”

“... Well, not entirely.”

“I forgive you, this time. You’re my favorite humble subject.”

Loki kissed him softly. “And you are mine.”

“Good.” Tony smiled contently. “Perfect.”

**Author's Note:**

> For anyone curious about the inspiration for the body art on Tony, I posted a pic example via [Tumblr post](http://defenestration-and-more.tumblr.com/post/91568486226/on-writing-frostiron-month) while in the middle of writing this story, which didn't start out intending to be part of the Catch & Release universe, but it just sort of happened.


End file.
